


The Other Side

by Dillian



Series: We Have Sown the Wind, and We Reap the Whirlwind [1]
Category: The Avengers (2012), Thor (Movies)
Genre: Alcohol-Fueled Vengefulness, Also Brutality, And Atrocities, Cruel Revenge for Loki's Own Atrocities, F/M, Group-Psychosis, In the End They All Wanted to Pretend it Didn't Happen, M/M, Merciless Rape, PTSD, Tagged for Violent-Character Abuse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-06-05
Updated: 2013-06-18
Packaged: 2017-12-14 01:20:57
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 9
Words: 14,666
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/831057
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dillian/pseuds/Dillian
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>I make no apologies.  Sometimes a story grabs you and you have to write it, even if you are appalled at the darkness of your own mind for even thinking of such a thing.</p><p>Odin has chosen a punishment for Loki.  He is to be used, as though he were a woman.  By coming to his friends The Avengers, Thor hopes to mitigate the severity of the punishment a little.  He does ...maybe... but only because the other alternative would have been to have the Destroyer do it.</p><p>Please do not read if you are uncomfortable with the thought of heroes having a darker side to their nature.  Please don't get mad because I wrote The Avengers giving in to theirs.  I did it, and I am not sorry.  But then as Norman Bates once said, we all go a little crazy sometimes, don't we?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Thor's Request

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Steve saw a lot of stuff happen during the War. He learned not to judge the people that do it.

“You know the day destroys the night  
Night divides the day  
Tried to run  
Tried to hide  
Break on through to the other side  
Break on through to the other side  
Break on through to the other side, yeah...”  
– The Doors

 

**_The Avengers_ , and _Thor_ , and all situations and characters thereof, belong strictly and solely to Marvel Comics. This is a fan-work, meant for enjoyment only, and not for any material profit.**

 

I was there when the whole thing happened. I heard the clap of thunder (that we all thought was a storm, because you do, you know; you don't just automatically assume that an alien is coming to visit you). I saw Thor's face when he told us what Odin decided about his brother.

...I saw Tony's face, when Thor asked us his question. I saw the light that came into his blue eyes, the curl of a smile on his lips. I didn't judge him for it. You have learn not to judge too much in combat, otherwise you're going to go crazy. I saw stuff when I was in Germany that will stick with me my whole life (which means forever, doesn't it?). I saw guys taking souvenirs, not just helmets, but the heads that they found in them. I saw what they did in the towns we marched into, and not just to the people who'd fought on the other side. I know where those impulses come from. A guy goes a little crazy after he faces death.

The troubling one was Bruce's reaction. Thor said his piece, he made his request. Then I saw Bruce go a little green. Not “I'm going to be sick,” green, although some of us might have been feeling that way inside – I know I was. – but the _other_ kind of green.

I heard Natasha's intake of breath. She's heard stories about Hulk, it shows in how she deals with him, and just having fought alongside him once isn't enough to have changed her much. 

She looked at him. -- We all looked. -- One minute he was Bruce, and then the next minute it was the big one, the monster standing there. His brows were drawn together. There was what you might call kind of a dark smile on his face. Those big hands of his kept clenching and unclenching.

“Puny god...” It came out in a low, growling mutter.

First Natasha was looking at Hulk, then she was looking at Thor. “I don't understand, exactly. What is it you want us to do?”

“Father has decreed Loki's punishment.” Thor said it like there was something sour in his mouth. He looked sad. “For his crimes in your realm, he is to be used as a woman is used.”

Rape? We all stared.

“It makes sense,” Clint said. “It makes a lot of sense. He abused us. – He _used_ us.” – For a minute, his eyes glowed. “Why shouldn't we abuse him in return?”

“Because we don't do that?” Tony looked sick, but behind the sickness, I could see it starting in him too: The curiosity, the group-psychosis; it's hard to avoid it, once it gets going. “We're not... We're not that kind of people here on Earth.” He looked at Thor. “What happens if we say no, Point Break?”

That sad look was still on Thor's face. “Certainly you may refuse my friends,” he said. “If you do so, I will have to ask my friends in Asgard for help.” His lips twisted. “Loki has history with them. The acts will be twice as bitter coming from them.”

“So we're like ...the good version of this happening?” I saw Tony breathe a little easier. His face started to relax. “Like, if it's not us it will be somebody worse?”

Thor nodded. “Even if they refuse, these acts are still going to happen. Once I saw a criminal... No one stepped forward to give him his punishment. Father had his Destroyer do the act, and all of Asgard watched. His crimes were not as dark as my brother's.”

“Loki's crimes were pretty dark.” Clint was the one who took to this the fastest. He looked at Natasha. “You know he deserves to be punished, Tash.”

“To be punished. But not by us.” Natasha looked around. She saw it, I could see that she saw the excitement that was starting in all of us. I could see her fighting it herself, but it was there. 

“This is like an assignment from SHIELD,” Clint said. “Like any other assignment.”

“Except SHIELD didn't ask us to do this.”

“Yeah,” he said, “but you know what Fury will say if we ask him.”


	2. The Prisoner Arrives

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> So they bring him to the Tower, the settle him in someplace where they can get to him easily. The next morning, the punishment starts.

I was expecting Fury to say we should cooperate with Asgardian justice. What came as a surprise was when he also said he wanted to _watch_. His face took on this hard look. “Ant versus boot just got a whole lot more interesting.” He said it was because of Coulson that he wanted to be there, but he didn't try very hard to hide the real reason. He just wanted to see Loki get punished.

We were all staying in the lower floors of the Tower at the time, in the floors that hadn't been damaged. Tony had barely had time even to get in touch with anyone about starting repairs. He hadn't heard back, much less gotten it scheduled for when they would be coming. This all happened less than a week after the invasion. The morgues were still full of dead Chitauri, crowding out the bodies of the human victims. Thinking about those morgues is part of why it was easy for me to get in the mood for what we were doing. It felt so wrong, that those killers were taking up space where the innocent should have been. ...Even though I'd seen the same thing happen with enemy wounded during the War.

I didn't need much encouragement though. We were all pretty primed for it. Tony kept a bunch of bottles on the sideboard in the main room (It used to be a conference center, back... ...Back when things had been normal. ...Back before Loki came). We all had their own glasses, and we all went back for refills pretty often. That's another thing I remember from the War: Killing and ...and the other stuff... feels easier as long as you've got a couple drinks under your belt.

Thor had his own room, but nobody bothered to give Loki a room. Thor said we didn't need to, that he wasn't going to be there long enough. 

He still had that gag on when Thor brought him, the one he put on him when they were going back to Asgard after the invasion. He wasn't chained or anything, because he didn't have to be. There were just these little silver bracelets around both his wrists. Thor said Odin controlled his movements, and his magic, with those. His face was thin and tired-looking, and bitter, very, very bitter. You could say he looked more like a victim than like a war-criminal, but what do war-criminals look like, really? I've seen people punished who looked just like anyone else. I've seen criminals nabbed after decades of freedom, guys that looked just like your brother, or your grandfather. Loki was guilty. He deserved what happened.

We put him upstairs, in the bombed-out, ruined remains of the penthouse. Tony said good enough for him. He said he was the reason it was like that, it served him right that he should stay there. Thor said wherever we put his brother, his fate was the same, so it didn't matter much. He didn't sound so convinced about that the next morning, after it had rained all night, and we found Loki crouched for shelter under the edge of a ruined kitchen cabinet.

I didn't care. I spent plenty of nights out during the war. All soldiers do, and they at least are fighting for something worthy. Were we supposed to care now, because a criminal's prison wasn't up to his liking?

Morning came. We all went upstairs. – We all took a shot of liquid courage on the way up, and we went upstairs. -- At first when we didn't find Loki, Tony was sure he'd escaped. “It's because JARVIS is disabled,” he kept muttering. “If we'd put him somewhere where we could keep an eye on him...”

Clint said if there was anybody who could escape with Odin's seals on his wrists, it would be Loki. “He's tricky,” he said. “I wouldn't put anything past him.”

It was Natasha that found him, pushed back as far as he could get himself, under what had been the cabinet where Tony kept his whiskey. He was sound asleep, with his clothes still wet, and his hair dried to a dark frizz of tangles.

“He looks like a sleeping baby.” That was Fury. He had a hard-look in his eyes, but then all of us did, so that didn't set him apart much. He looked around at us. “Who's going to wake him up?”


	3. Hulk's Turn

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> None of them are ever going to forget what happened, when that big green hand reached under the cabinet and pulled him out.

Afterward, all of us wished that we'd been the ones that stepped forward. But you don't, you know. When you're in the middle of something like that, there's this adjustment process. First you realize you're going to do it, then it's another bridge you have to cross before you realize what that means. 

“I guess I'll...” Clint just had his mouth open when Hulk pushed past him. – He pushed past all of us. 

“Puny god...” He gave this grin, that looked more like he was baring his teeth. 

I felt bad about letting him go in like that, and I don't think I was the only one. Later on I told myself it was because he was _Hulk_. People don't get in the way, when that guy wants something. I don't think that was it, though. We'd decided it was going to happen, see? It was like we'd let go of the reins, and after that it wasn't about what any of us did or didn't want to have happen, it was just about what happened.

Hulk reached one big hand under the cabinet. We heard a crash. That was the sound of the rest of it breaking. Then there was a thud. That was Loki's body, banging against what was left. He came out feet-first, with Hulk's hand around his ankle. His hair was in the way, so I didn't see his face, and I didn't hear anything, because he still had the gag on.

Hulk carried him into what was left of the living room, like that, like you'd carry a bug you found under your sink. There was about the same size difference too. Hulk's hand was sort of waist-level, and Loki's hair barely brushed the floor. He swung a little, I remember, as Hulk walked, and his hair went back and forth. This time I did see his face. I wish I hadn't. – I wished it even then. I knew those green eyes of his were going to be hard to forget.

The picture window in the living room was still gone of course, since the builders hadn't started yet. There were still these huge, Loki-sized holes in the floor, that showed what had happened when Hulk got hold of him before. Hulk walked past the holes. He walked over to the sofa, which was wet, and a little moldy-looking (we'd had rain every day since the invasion).

“So this is really going to happen,” I heard Clint say.

I watched, as Hulk ripped Loki's black pants right off his legs, and bent him double, over the back of the sofa. We were in front of the sofa. What we saw, was Loki's black hair, his pale, bare shoulders, and Hulk's big chest, and big, big grin.

“You going soft on us Barton?” Fury said (but his own voice wasn't quite steady either). “You're the last one I would have expected to worry about Loki.”

“My brother will be all right.” Thor looked like he wanted to go to him. He kept shifting from one foot to the other, and his hand never left Mjolnir the whole time we were up there (except for ...well, except for when it was _his turn_ , of course). He just stayed right where he was though, and watched. “The Odinforce will sustain him,” he said.

“What's the Odinforce?” I looked over and Tony had a drink in his hand. That was the thing with him. I don't think I saw him without one, practically the whole time we were up there. I _think_ he was trying to convince himself it was the alcohol making him do it. I don't think he bought it though, even while it was happening.

Thor didn't answer. He was staring... We were all staring, as Hulk ripped his own pants down and revealed...

You know one thing that's really been hard getting used to about living in the Twenty-First Century, is the language. People use words that they didn't use in the gutter, back in my time. Four-letter words and vulgarity aren't the only possible way to communicate, but you'd think so from the way everyone uses them all the time. There's such a thing as _respect_ , and if more people understood that, the world would be a better place. ...That being said, there was no respect in what happened to Loki that day; it was graphic and horrible. I might as well use the right words to describe it.

What we saw, was Hulk's penis, or his cock, you might say. It was hard, and it was big. – Think about the size of your forearm, and you'll be close to the size. I think it was a little bigger than that. – It rose straight up out of a nest of hair that was dark-green like the hair on his head, and it was ...well, it was _leaking_ a little with excitement.

“He's going to put that thing in Loki?” Tony was starting to sound a little drunk by then. He has to drink a lot before you can hear it in his voice.

“Shut up, Stark,” Fury said.

Hulk had one big hand on each of Loki's hips. He was ...well, he was parting his ass-cheeks, probably. He was making himself an entrance.

“I've heard of larger things going into a guy.” Tony just couldn't seem to shut up. “You've all heard of fisting, right? You know what that is. And I heard about a guy that had a live guinea pig up in there. Only it wasn't alive any more by the time they...”

“ _Shut up_ , Stark!” Natasha looked like she wanted to his him. “Does he need to be here? I mean seriously, will someone get him the fuck out of here?”

“I am sorry my friends,” Thor said. “By Father's edict, all of you must be here for the punishment to have effect.”

“You knew that,” Fury says. “You can't tell me that you all didn't know that. What are you going to do, folks? Are you going to pussy out right when your friend needs you?”

“Bad version of the same speech you gave us when...”

_When Coulson died._ that's what Tony was going to say, I think. He didn't get a chance to finish though, because he stopped dead when Hulk went in. We all stopped what we were doing, and we just stared.

What we saw, was his body coming closer, his hands lifting Loki and angling him. What we saw was Loki's head come up. His hair flew back, for a moment, and we could see the gag. Then... Well then... Listen, no matter what Tony says about people doing things like that all the time, a man's body isn't designed to take something that size. It's not designed to take it unwillingly, anyway, not when there hasn't even been any preparation.

I don't know what I was expecting. I think I thought the “Odinforce” that was some kind of magical protection, that it would _stretch_ Loki or something. It didn't. You couldn't hear Loki scream, because of the gag, but you could hear his bones break all right. Something was giving, when Hulk went in there, and we could all hear it. 

Loki flopped like a rag doll. His head flew up and down, and his hands did a sort of a dance on the dirty plush of the sofa. There were grunting, animal sounds from Hulk, followed by a sigh of pure, satisfied pleasure.

Then he pulled out, and I thought I saw Loki's blood and shit, mixed, all over his cock. I probably didn't. It was kind of a dark color for anything to show up. I knew they were there, and that's probably what made me think that.

He gestured. – He was still holding onto Loki's hip, and his limp body flopped worse than ever. ...And we all saw his blood running out, all over the couch. – “Who next?”


	4. Clint and Natasha Share the Next Turn

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Loki's quick recovery, and the seal Odin has placed on his strength, make subduing him so the rest of them can have a turn, much easier.

_Nobody_ wanted to go next after that. “Sloppy seconds much?” I heard Tony mutter. That's always his way: When he doesn't know what to do, he cracks jokes. This one wasn't very funny, with Loki's body in front of us, with the blood and the shit all over it. None of us wanted to touch that kind of “sloppy” with a ten-foot pole. Maybe we could have killed him right then (if Asgardianas can die), but none of us could have fucked him. The idea was impossible.

Well Hulk finally let go of the limp body. He stomped off. I don't know where he went; we didn't see him the whole rest of the time, and when we went downstairs again, it was Bruce that met us. I wanted to ask him if he remembered any of what had happened, but I couldn't. I couldn't get the words out, past that image of his green Other Self, and his hand on Loki's bloody body.

All of us just stood there. We just stood, looking at what was left of Loki. “This has to be finished,” Fury said at last. “Somebody's going to have to...” Even he was having trouble talking though. I heard a sound that I think was him swallowing. Then, “Romanov,” he said. “You go. You're the only one of us that doesn't have to...” He looked down at his pants. Then all the rest of us did. We all knew what he meant. “Take something,” Fury said. “Use it... We promised Thor we'd do this.”

Natasha didn't move right away, though. Drakov's daughter, the hospital fire, no matter she'd seen in her life, nothing could have prepared her for this, for having to go over and _violate_ someone that looked like that. She looked over at Thor. “He is _alive_ , isn't he? I'm not ...you know...” Then she looked at Fury. “There are some things I won't do, Director. If he's dead, I'm not doing it. Fuck SHIELD, you can't make me.”

“He's alive.” Thor's voice came out as a croak. “And he will heal. That is what the Odinforce does.”

“As long as he's alive.” Natasha moved forward. She went slowly, sort of tottering a little, not to Loki first, but over to what had been the kitchen. We heard her rooting around in the drawers. She came out with a long-handled spatula, an unbroken bottle of Tony's Scotch, then finally, a carrot. “One of these,” I heard her mutter, “or ...or all of them. – Clint, help me.”

“Agent Barton.” Fury gestured toward Loki's body with his chin. “Help the lady.”

“This is bullshit,” he said. “I didn't sign up for this.” He went over to Loki, though. I saw his hands where Hulk's big ones had been before, on Loki's hips, moving the body. He touched, probed him a little. Then he looked back at us. “Thor's right. He's already healing.”

“Healing?” Natasha came in with her... Well, with her _supplies_ , I guess you'd say... She came in with the things she would be using to do it. Her voice sounded a little stronger. “How, healing?”

“Feel him.” Clint stepped back from the... From Loki. “Move him around.”

She was over there with her hands on Loki's hips then. I saw her angle him one way, then the other. “I don't feel any bone breakage,” she muttered. “His body feels resistant... – Rigor setting in? No, but he's not...” 

That was when Loki's hands came up and grabbed her wrists. His head came up, then he was staring at her. Then he was standing upright, staring at her, and we could see murder in his eyes. His face moved. He was trying to talk of course, but with the gag on, we couldn't hear what he said. 

Natasha's eyes were huge. Her face was pale. “Thor... What the hell is this?”

“The Odinforce.” It was Tony that said it. He laughed, sounding halfway between drunk and crazy. “It's the fuckin' Odinforce. What Thor talked about. We all get to start over again, see? Nobody has to fuck a d... ...A dead...” He stopped with a choking sound, then turned away. We could all hear him vomiting. Then we heard his mutter, “Jesus Christ, there's not enough liquor _in_ this fuckin' Tower...”

Natasha calmed down pretty quickly, though. She took a breath, stood up straighter. Then she looked over at Thor. “How powerful is he?”

Thor didn't answer. I don't know if he could. Things were happening so fast, and let's remember, this was his _brother_ they were happening to (even if it was a brother who'd been trying to kill him ever since the first time we'd seen either of them). His shoulders moved, his mouth opened. Nothing came out.

“He picked people up and threw them through plate glass windows when he was here before,” Clint said. He looked over at Natasha, then he looked at Thor. “Is she going to need help to restrain him?”

Natasha had pulled free of Loki's hands by now, but she hadn't gotten the fight out of him. He was standing on the balls of his feet, looking this way, that way, as if searching for how he was going to leave when he ran. His face had that evil, desperate look of his, even now, even without magic or any other kind of hope at all. 

It was Natasha that moved first, though. “You talked about a seal.” She didn't wait for Thor to answer. “I'm going to assume your father wouldn't send us a prisoner he knew we couldn't handle.” She made a dive, nabbed both Loki's wrists and pulled them behind him. A moment later he wasn't visible any more, down on his knees behind the sofa. “You want this easy, or hard, Loki?” Her voice was a little uneven, out-of-breath sounding. That's the only way you could tell she'd been upset at all by what happened.

“It's going to be hard,” Fury said. “Agent Romanov, bring him around where we can all see it.”

“My friends,” Thor protested. “You don't have to... It is enough that it happens.” He sounded relieved at the thought of _not_ seeing it. Well really, it was his brother we were doing it to, after all.

“Yeah.” Fury gave a short nod. “Trust me, you have to. Bring him out, Agent Romanov.”

“I'll help,” Clint said. A moment later he and Natasha came out into the open, Loki on his knees, still naked from the waist down, between them.

“There's glass on the floor over there.” Tony seemed to have recovered a little. He had another drink in his hand, and he sounded more cheerful. “From when he threw me out the window. Serve the little fucker right.”

Clint looked at Natasha. “You want to go first?”

She looked at his pants. “Are you ready?”

We all looked. He was. Some guys get over trauma fast; guys with a lot of training. He looked at her. Then he grinned. “No, both of us.”

There was a zip. Then his pants dropped to the ground. We saw him naked and ready. “The bottle's good, Tash. Start with that. I'll...” He looked over at Thor. “The gag, can you take it off?”

“Is it necessary?” Thor sounded miserable. “Must I...” He broke off. “I have the key, yes.”

It only took a moment to get Loki ready. He was bare at both ends now. – As soon as he had his mouth free, he started spitting insults. Just foul stuff, insulting our manhood, our characters, our loyalty... It was the only way he had left of defending himself, but the thing was, it just made us angrier. And the angrier we got, the easier it was to think about doing this. ...The easier, and the more exciting... There was something he said about my mother... – About my mother and me, and us ...you know... – That was the moment when I could feel myself start hardening, was when he said that.

Clint went in first. He grabbed Loki's hair and jerked his head upward. “Take it,” he said. “Take all of it.” You could see Loki struggling, but Thor was right, Odin must have sealed half his strength or more. There was nothing he could do to get away. You could hear him choking and coughing though, as it went in.

I looked over at Tony. – Crazy what you do in a situation like that, huh? But I knew he was more of an expert about this than I was. – “Will a man ...you know, will all of that fit in there?”

“Deep-throating.” Tony sounded cheerful (and drunk as an owl). “You have to learn how. God _damn_ , what did I do in a former life, to get to be here and watch Loki learn! I must have been a fuckin' _saint_.”

“Yeah, you were never a saint.” –

There was a scream right then. That was when the bottle went in – Backwards, and all the way to the neck of it. – and Loki fought so hard he actually got free from Clint, and he screamed.

“You little, fuckin' shit.” Clint backhanded him hard. “You fuckin' _hurt_ me. Now I'm going to do you twice as hard.”

You wonder why I'm putting all this down? I kind of wonder myself. There could be some serious trouble if anyone ever found this document. It's not so much our lily-pure super-hero reputations that would be hurt by it... -- I've been in the Twenty-First Century for long enough now that I know people understand now, that even super-heroes aren't always angels. – Most of what we did was pretty illegal though. I mean, if you can figure out the rights that an extra-terrestrial, convicted war-criminal, non-US-citizen is supposed to have, when their own ruler's specifically mandated for you to do such-and-such (that happens to be illegal in your own jurisdiction) to him, then some of it _might_ be illegal... When you've got the head of a top government agency right there, telling you to do all of it... I don't think we'd be in a really good situation if it came out, legal-wise, I mean. 

Why am I putting it down? I don't know. Because the super-soldier serum's messed with my physiology and it looks like there's no end for me, I think. Because a thousand years from now, when there's no United States left to defend, and no other super-heroes left with me to defend it, I'm still going to be here, and I'd better be able to live with myself. Sometimes it helps to say the things that are on your mind. ...To say them somewhere... Even if you can't say them out loud.

I looked over at Loki. Clint was buried in his throat as far as he would go. Natasha was going at him from the other end, with a carrot in her hand, and the bottle and the spatula standing by in case she got bored. I'm going to confess right now, because I have to, I have to rip the scab off this one: I watched. And I had fun while I watched. 

I was so hard inside my pants that I was aching, and ideas were starting to crowd my head about what I'd do to him when it was my turn. I moved a little, and the cloth of my undershorts rubbed me... It rubbed me like... – Do I have to spell out how it rubbed me? – I could have let myself come then, just by rubbing a little more, and thinking about a few of the things I was going to do to Loki in a little more detail. It rubbed like that, see? I didn't want to come then, though. Because by now I knew I was going to ask for the next turn.

Then I didn't look away again. Nobody else was looking away either, that I could see (except Thor; I think it was during my turn that he finally started watching). Fury looked like he'd just gotten the world's biggest Christmas present. Tony looked like he was about to fall over, but happy too, he looked as happy as Fury did.

Clint and Natasha kept on doing what they were doing. After a while, Clint gave a satisfied groan and pulled out. “Oh fuck, that was good,” I heard him say.

Natasha kept on until... Well she kept on until Loki came too. Because he did, you know. Forcible or not, stimulation is stimulation. And men's bodies are crude; we're not designed to _not_ like stimulation. He came. Clint gave a shout of laughter.

He patted Loki's cheek. “You like this, babe? Just wait, you're going to get a lot more.”

We all laughed too. Like it was all a big joke. Like it was a party. And it was sort of a party; the only way it could have gotten to be more so, was if we'd ordered in some pizza and had lunch up there. But that part at least, we waited for. We didn't get the pizza until we were all done and downstairs again.


	5. The Cap Tries Him

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Steve's never taken a man from behind before. The fact that the Odinforce regenerates Loki's body every time, makes it all the more difficult for him.

This wasn't my first time with a man. People seem to have the idea that I'm some kind of simon-pure choirboy. The other Avengers used to think I was so innocent. They'd make jokes about it. I was never as innocent as all that. I'd seen things, growing up in Brooklyn. I'd done things overseas, during the War. 

And it wasn't my first time with a man. Bucky and I experimented one time. His reputation as a lady-killer came later. When I first knew him, we were just awkward kids, both of us wanting a lot more attention than any woman wanted to give us. We wanted to find out what we were missing. It's natural, a kid does. So we got together one time in my bedroom. We turned off the lights, and shut the curtains tight so the streetlight wouldn't come in. Neither of us wanted to see each other's face. That would have ruined it. With it dark in there, it was just one mouth against another mouth. It was just something soft and warm and wet, touching parts of us that had never been touched before, except by our own hands. When we were done, we both rolled over right away and went to sleep, me in my bed, him in the bedroll he'd brought along so he could sleep over.

It didn't take me long, watching the others with Loki though, to know that my little experience with Bucky didn't apply at all. This wasn't just a different ballgame, we were in another whole ball _park_ here. I was starting as a raw-red, baby-brand-new virgin again. This didn't make it any less irritating when I stepped forward for my turn, and I heard Tony yell:

“Go get 'im, Cap! Must be great to try something new at your age.”

New. Right. Because anyone who isn't a polymorphous pervert like him must be a beginner at everything.

I was going to go ask Thor for a turn. But Thor was nowhere in sight. -- It turned out later, he was downstairs, pretty much drinking up everything in sight. He came back up later on, in a way different mood than he'd been in when he went down there. A “berserker” mood, he called it, meaning something violent, a little bit crazy. – When I didn't see him, I went over to Fury instead.

He was leaning against a pillar where some of the ceiling was still up, with his arms folded. He'd just watched everything that Clint and Natasha did, and he looked pretty comfortable with it. This probably wasn't the worst thing that he'd ever ordered SHIELD agents to do.

“Sir,” I said. “I want to go next.”

“Oh really?” I'll give the Director credit, at least he didn't ask whether I was up to it. I get pretty tired of people always thinking there are things I _won't_ do. If a thing's necessary, I'll do it. That's how you get a job done. He looked at me. Then he looked over at Tony. “You don't think Stark? He's getting pretty drunk. If we put it off, he might not be able to. And you know Thor said it had to be all of us.”

_All of us..._ It's only when Fury put it like that, that I realized he was planning on going too. I wondered if Thor had thought about that. Or Odin All-Father, who sent Loki to us in the first place.

I looked at Tony. He didn't seem any wobblier than he had when Clint and Natasha started. “I think he recognizes the gravity of what we're doing, sir.” I thought he'd also started to enjoy it, like the rest of us had, too. I thought there was no way he'd do anything at this point, that would interfere with his chances to try Loki out for himself. But how do you say something like that to a superior officer? I stuck to the most important things that had to be said and left it there.

Fury looked at Tony again. Then he looked back at me and nodded. “All right, Cap. You're next.” He put his hand on my arm. “You do know what you're doing?”

I looked over at Loki. Clint and Natasha were still right there. They had him between them on his knees, like he was their prize show-dog. But that was no look of doglike devotion that I saw on his face. His eyes glowed pure evil malice, and his lips kept working, forming silent, evil words (I thought). Words I couldn't understand, from lip-reading them. Magic words, maybe, that didn't work because his magic had been sealed. Or Norse curse-words, maybe.

“I'm going in,” I said to Fury. “Like Natasha, only you know, with my...” I patted my leg, close to, but not directly on top of the hardness in my pants.

The Director gave a tight nod. “Very good. – Have you thought about his regenerative ability, Cap?” he added. “Remember how he came back from almost-dead after the Hulk? I'm pretty sure that means his ...ah, _insides_ are coming back to normal every time too. He's ...er, a virgin inside again now, just like he was before Natasha.”

It was such a technical way of talking about him. Like he was a specimen in a lab. I think to Fury, he kind of was. This was a golden opportunity that had been dropped into his lap, to experiment on the body of an actual Asgardian, and find out how they worked. He was making notes inside his head the whole time, I think. I've wondered since, how long it took after we left, before he ran back to his computer and wrote it all down.

All I said though, was, “A virgin, sir?”

Fury looked at me. He looked at the dumb look on my face. I'll admit, I didn't know what he was getting at. I'd been inside men's warm mouths before, and inside women's warm vaginas. A “virgin”, I thought, meant a cute, tight little cherry for me to pop. 

“He's _tight_ ,” Fury said. “That's pure, solid muscle, a man has inside there. It's designed to force things out. You'll be going in, if you see what I mean.”

I nodded. I saw.

“Most people use something.” Fury looked around. “Stark lives here. Knowing him, there's probably something in the bedroom. Or you can find something in one of the kitchen cupboards. Oil, or shortening, or something.”

Shortening. It was like a joke. I was going to beat Loki like cake batter. I was going to knead him like biscuit dough. I held back a grin. “I'll do my best, sir.”

Fury nodded again. “Good man.”

I went over to Loki. I took him by the shoulder and yanked him upward. He turned on me with the evilest look I've ever seen on a man's face, just this glare of pure, nasty malice. “You think you can break me? Laufeyson will not be broken by a _mortal_.” He spat that last word. “Mortal” was still the ultimate insult to him. It was a joke to me, of course, because I'm not mortal. Haven't been since '42. But it made me mad too. My friends are more than just “mortals”, thank you very much.

“Not here to break you,” I said. “Just here to do a job.” – It wasn't the truth of course. I was there to have fun. The fact that I was doing something that needed done at the same time? Icing on the cake. – “I want you to brace yourself against the sofa.”

Evil green eyes, eyes lit with crazy hate that scared me even knowing I was in charge here, met mine for a second. “And if I refuse?”

“I'll make you. Bend over,” I said. “Take this like a man.”

I thought I heard the word “monster” go across Loki's lips then, but of course it didn't mean anything to me at the time. I just thought he was calling me a “monster”, and to tell the truth, I kind of felt like one. A strong monster. A really powerful one. Like King Kong, taking Faye Wray up on top of that building, and we all know what he's going to do with her up there.

Turned out, I didn't need to get anything out of the kitchen cupboard to do it. And I didn't need to look around in the wreckage of Tony's bedroom either. There was a tube of stuff in the drawer of one of the coffee tables. Don't get me started about the kind of a man who needs tubes of that stuff all over their _living room._ Like they can't even wait long enough to go into the bedroom and get it. Like they don't keep their medical things in the bathroom like normal people. Later on, Tony said he kept it there for when his girlfriend was over, but that still didn't make the questions go away. And it was way more insight into his private life than I'd ever wanted.

Anyway, I got the stuff out. Since then, I've used a bit more of it now and then. This stuff was pretty standard. Not deteriorated by the explosion or it's being rained on or anything. I unscrewed the cap and felt a dab of it. It was slick, kind of cold against my fingers. I thought about putting that coldness all over my penis, and I shuddered a little. That just left one other place to put it.

My hand on Loki's neck, I shoved. “Bend over.” I pushed until Loki's backside angled upward, easily reachable by my hands, or my penis. The cheeks of it opened a little. With my right hand, I opened them the rest of the way, so I could see his opening peeking out from in between them. It looked pretty small, all right. Pretty tight and hard to enter. 

I squirted a big glob of that lube stuff in there. I massaged it around a little. It started going everyplace right away, and I knew that wasn't going to work. So the next thing I did, was to massage it _inside_... I mean, I used my fingers to slide it into his hole.

Pretty soon, it was my fingers going in there. First one, then two. I slid them in a little, and at first, I could feel the tightness. The lube took care of that though, and soon they were all the way in. Two, then three... I thought about what Tony had said about “fisting”: Yeah, I could see where you could get a whole hand in there, if you used enough of the stuff.

I didn't want to do that though. I didn't want to waste what was inside me. I'd been hard for a good half an hour now, hard, and aching to where it was actually starting to get painful. I wanted to put that thing inside Loki's tight little back-hole. I wanted to put it in once. – I wanted to take him just as hard and fast as I could, just to get rid of the load I could feel building up inside me. -- Then I wanted to give it to him again, slower the second time, slow enough that I could relax and see what it really felt like to take a man like that.

As it happened, I only got to do it the once. -- Only once where it was the full monty like that anyway. – There were seven of us, and only one Loki. We all had to share. We had to take our turns and play nice. There were other things some of us ended up doing if we felt frisky enough. None of us came out feeling disappointed after we were done, and that's the main thing.

Getting back to the story: I had the lube massaged into his back-opening, and it was starting to feel pretty smooth in there, pretty loose. So I took hold of his backside, one hand on either cheek to balance me, and I went right on in. I thrust myself in hard... That's when I realized that the lube hadn't even _touched_ most of the muscles I was going to have to go past. A man is really, really _tight_ back there, a man who isn't used to having other men do him that way, anyway. There's muscles in there that you have to fight against every single time, and it's only after a lot of practice that they learn to get used to being used this way.

Loki hadn't had a whole lot of practice. Aside from what we gave him he hadn't, anyway. And the Odinforce meant that he regenerated right back to virgin-state in between each of us, just like Fury said he would. I had to force myself a good bit before it got easy, moving around in there. I forced, and I shoved. 

If I'd been going to predict, I would have said that would make it feel bad... You know, it would reduce my satisfaction, having to force myself like that. It didn't. If anything, it made it feel better. There was this mean little feeling that started inside me: _If it feels like this for me,_ I kept thinking, _what must it feel like for Loki?_ And then after that, _good enough for him,_ I thought. And you know, I think the thoughts actually made the sex better.

It was damn good sex. I went hard and I went fast. I heard some sobbing. I thought it was me (you know, because it felt so good). It turned out, it was actually Loki. I took him in huge, rutting thrusts, like a dog fucks, or like a bull with his herd. It was sweaty, and it was exciting, – Probably the most exciting sex I'd ever had, and it was good, you know? That it was nonconsensual I mean? That was okay, because it was Loki, and he deserved this. – and it was damn fast. It was probably the _fastest_ sex I've ever had, as well as the most exciting.

After I was done, I grabbed hold of a big chunk of Loki's hair, and I pulled until he was facing me. The evil look had all gone off his face. It made me feel _good_ to see it was gone. All that was left there were his eyes streaming tears, and his nose streaming snot, and his mouth, turned down at the sides and streaming spittle out both sides as well. He was _crying_. _Good enough for him,_ I remember thinking again. _He made plenty of other people cry._ It made me feel strong, knowing I was the one who'd made him cry. He didn't cry with Clint and Natasha, see? And of course, I'd remembered that.

Then I kissed him right in the middle of his spittle-streaming mouth. I held onto his head from both sides, and I kissed him, thrusting my tongue down his throat, just as hard as I'd thrust my penis up him the other way. Then I let go. I sort of shoved him aside and let go, and I saw him topple over as I walked away. I pulled up my pants as I walked. They were going to be dirty, I remember thinking as I left. Loki had left blood, as well as other stuff, all over my penis.

Thor was back again, I saw. “Your brother's a good lay,” I told him, and I wanted it to come out sounding hurtful.


	6. Thor's Turn

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Thor, berserk, is the most terrifying thing any of them have ever seen. He puts Loki and his Chitauri to shame.

Like I said, Thor was different, when he came back upstairs. If you only know him like he usually is, cheerful, friendly, always up for a drink or a game of some kind... – Even if you know him like he was during the invasion, angry at his brother, and totally focused on defending Earth against its attackers, well you just have no idea what he was like that day. 

I didn't notice him at first, when he came back up; I was busy at the time. That was when I was ...well, when I was doing my share of what we did to Loki. ...I was doing something, at any rate. I had other things on my mind than who might or might not have been watching me (although I'll be honest: The idea that there were people watching, kind of gave it a little added edge of excitement). First time I noticed Thor again was when I finished. I pushed Loki away, then I turned to the others. There was Thor, and I remember I said something nasty to him. “Your brother's a good fuck,” or something like that.

He gave me a look. His eyes were little and hot-looking. His hair had gone all stringy and sweaty and it was in his face, strands of it, falling into those red-rimmed blue eyes of his.

“Are you?” His voice was different too, rougher, hoarse-sounding. You used to still see dray-horses in the streets sometimes, when I was growing up. I thought about them, about the rough, panting noises they'd make when the load they were pulling was too heavy, or about the sound of a dog just on the verge of growling, when I heard Thor. “I ask you, Captain,” he said, “are you? For I shall not be ready to finish after Loki.”

I was still feeling pretty crazy, but that sobered me right up. There wasn't an ounce of me that thought he didn't mean it. We'd brought him here... Or he'd brought us here... His father had sent him, and he was here, and we were... It wasn't a matter of fault any more, I mean. It wasn't important who'd sent who. The thing was, he'd had to kill pretty well everything that made him Thor inside, to be able to do this. Now that it was dead, this was what was left, this dangerous, frightening beast, who might just as well attack us, as Loki.

I've faced down Hulk lots of times, and this was scarier. At least with Hulk, you can see where he's still a human being inside. I mean he has got other feelings besides anger, and they're human feelings. You know if things get too bad, the big guy's going to feel some guilt about it. Looking at Thor that day, I remembered that he _wasn't_ human, and we all had no idea really, how his kind operated. It was like looking at something from another planet. ...Like that joke they tell about the Lone Ranger, where he tells Tonto, “Looks like we'll have to fight the entire tribe,” and then Tonto says, “what do you mean 'we', Paleface?” ...Only this wasn't a joke. This was deadly-dangerous serious.

“We'd better hope he comes out of this.” It was Fury, saying it. His voice was low, reasonable-sounding, but low, and with just an edge of tension to it, like how a man might sound who was trying not to anger a rabid dog. 

Then Natasha said, “I can go get Hulk.” It said something about her state of mind that she should say that. She was the one most scared of Hulk of us all.

“Not yet,” Fury said. “Let's hold that one in case we need it.”

None of the rest of us talked. -- I think it was the only time in the entire day that Tony didn't talk. – We just stood there and we watched, and I don't think I was the only one who was feeling like we'd unleashed a machine that we couldn't control.

“Loki!”

Loki was still where I'd left him, half-standing, half sitting on the arm of the ruined sofa. He looked up at his brother's voice. You know how in a really extreme situation, there will be certain images that stick in your mind? That's one of them for me, is the picture of him looking up as Thor spoke. The sun was almost overhead by then, and the destroyed ceiling didn't do much to block it. Sunlight shone off the little strands of Loki's tangled hair and made a golden, glowing halo. It threw his face into shadow. All you could see was the curve of his lips, – he was smiling, I think. – and the outline of his nose.

“Brother?” There wasn't any wariness or fear in his voice. It was the voice of someone who has no cause to think anything but good of the other person. The only way you knew he was faking it at all, was because Loki never called Thor “brother”. All he ever did was go on and on about how they _weren't_ brothers, they _couldn't be_ brothers, and what's more, he wouldn't be brothers with the likes of him even if he could be. “What is it you wish?”

Then there was a squeaking sound. It still didn't sound anywhere near as “aware” as it should have, if you see what I mean. It didn't sound like the noise a guy would make if he knew danger was coming his way, more like the squeak of a rabbit that's gotten caught in a trap. It was a surprised sound, a sort of a babyish sound. It was only later on that I figured out this was Loki using his tricky nature, to try and protect himself.

Thor grabbed his brother by the arm and hauled him up until his feet didn't touch the ground. “Now this will be done,” he said, in that new, growling voice of his. “Now you are mine.”

“Brother, no.” There was still no fear in Loki's voice, just sweet reasonableness and innocence. He earned his reputation as a liar, I can tell you. No one, but _no one_ could have not been scared, when faced with something that looked like Thor did then – That acted like he did! – but he still looked completely calm. “Reconsider, I pray you. Do not do this act, that transgresses the bonds of family.”

“You speak of family,” Thor growled. He threw Loki across the sofa facedown, with his buttocks up in the air. – _Those buttocks are fresh and new again,_ I remember thinking. _It's just like I was never in there._ – He grabbed him by the hips. “Now this shall be done.”

“No!” The fear was starting to break into Loki's voice now. “Think of Mother. – Of what we were to each other...”

“Silence!” Thor dealt him a blow that almost knocked Loki off the sofa. “Speakest not, knave!”

“Mother would not want this...” Loki sounded terrified now. “Father... “

Another blow. “Will you not be silent?” Thor said. “Then I shall make you silent.”

He grabbed something. I thought it was Loki's neck, and we were going to see just how far the Odinforce was able to go. Then there was a ripping sound, and Thor's hands came away with the remains of his brother's green shirt in them. He grabbed for a handful of hair, got his head back, and shoved a wad of fabric in his mouth to keep him quiet.

“ _Now_ I will get what I came for,” Thor said, and his hands went right back to Loki's hips like nothing had happened.

“You know this is disgusting?” It was Natasha's voice. – We were all on the opposite side of the sofa again. I was just past the coffee table. Clint was to my left. Natasha was to my right and behind me. – “I don't care if this is Loki. He's going to kill him. Are we all just going to stand and let that happen?”

“Shh.” Tony put a hand on her arm. “You want him to come for us too?”

“You could sit down and watch it happen,” Fury said from his place next to the pillar. “This is Asgardian justice, Agent Romanov. It's not our place to intervene.”

Asgardian justice...

Thor's penis, in case you ever wanted to know, is red and angry-looking. It comes out of a tangle of red-gold hair and it's not that long, but it's thick for its size. His stomach is just a little less flat than you'd expect, from how strong he is. It sags just the slightest bit, enough so that red penis of his brushes it when it's hard. It was pressed against his stomach then, with him bent over like he was, and holding onto Loki. He was breathing hard, and it bounced a little, and his stomach bounced too. Somewhere along the line he'd gotten rid of his armor. I'm not sure when. Maybe he magicked it away the way his brother used to do during the invasion. All he had on was a loose shirt, shoved back at the sleeves to show his forearms, and rucked up in front to show his stomach, and his hard, throbbing penis.

“You are mine, Trickster.” Some of the rage had gone out of his voice, but he didn't sound any less dangerous. It was still a growl, the growl of a jungle cat, about to savage its prey. “Mine...”

Thor held onto Loki by the hips. He didn't bother separating his buttocks, he didn't bother with lube or anything like that. He just positioned himself, and then he gave a _push_. Then he was rutting, pounding into him so hard you were surprised the sofa held up. Loki couldn't say anything through the gag Thor had given him. The only sound was the one Thor made himself, a horrible growling, grunting noise, like an animal eating. He went on like that. – He kept it up way past what you'd think a man could do. But of course he wasn't a man, he was an Asgardian. – Then after a long, long while, he let out a deep breath and stood up straight.

“How I needed that,” he said.

“This is fucked up,” I heard Natasha begin. 

Then there was the sound of flesh against flesh that was Tony slapping her. “Get hold of yourself. Keep quiet. – You think we like it?”

Thor barely even looked our way though. I'm not sure he even knew we were there at that point. He just gave one last look at Loki. Then, despite all that he'd said about wanting some more after he finished with him, he just walked away, past us and on to the stairs and out of the penthouse, while we all felt like we'd dodged a bullet.

I heard a sigh from Fury. “This is taking years off my life.”

Then from Tony, “ _Your_ life? Give me a fuckin' break!”

“The question,” Fury said, “is who wants to go next after that?”

None of us did.

“I already went,” Clint said.

I nodded. “Me too.”

“Of course we all know there's only one person who could follow an act like that...” Tony was talking, but it didn't sound like he meant it. – I'm not sure he even knew what he was saying. – It was just blather, like his mouth had disconnected itself from his brain. ...Like one part of him was trying to tell all the other parts that they hadn't just seen what they'd saw, that they weren't a part of it. It was all Fury needed, though. It gave him the excuse he wanted, so he wouldn't have to go next himself.

“Good man, Stark.” He gestured toward Loki, still facedown on the sofa. “You're next.”


	7. Tony Uses Him

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> When the only civilian of the group takes his turn, he has trouble making things go as planned.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please bear with me if the quality is at all _lacking_ in this chapter. It's really hard for me to wrap my mind around Tony participating in a situation like this, and I needed to massage the circumstances a little to get him to do it.

Well by this time, we were getting used to how Loki recovered after each go-round. None of us were surprised to see him push himself up after a minute or two. He rolled over, stood, then leaned back against the sofa. His face was pale and tired-looking, his eyes looked kind of sunken, and his tangled hair fell across half his face.

What surprised us, was how long it took Tony to go claim his turn. Minutes kept going by, and Loki just stood there. He was on his side of the sofa, we were on the other side. It was like he was onstage, only he wasn't doing anything but standing there. I kept expecting Tony to go grab him. I kept picturing it: He had as much reason to be angry at Loki as any of us, and he certainly wasn't averse to sex. What was keeping him?

Then after a couple minutes a thought came: _Tony's a civilian. Maybe he can't do this._ I snuck a look over at him. He was standing at an angle; I couldn't see if he was hard or not. In a way, it was a good thing. It would have felt awfully intrusive to be able to see a thing like that with the other man not showing it to you. In a way, it was frustrating. It still left me with my questions intact.

“Go ahead, Tony.” It was Natasha that said it. “You remember what Thor said: We all have to do it.” I think she said that last, because she knew he was having qualms.

“You can't say you don't want to,” Clint said. “This is _Loki_.”

“ _Loki,_ yes.” I don't know what Loki thought he was doing. I don't know why in hell he thought taunting one of us was a good idea. He must have known the rest of us would hurt him, even if Tony didn't. “I am he, the monster that must be used and destroyed.” He threw a look Tony's way. “What is the matter, Stark? Performance issues?”

Performance issues: It was something the two of them had talked about before, I think. It got Tony moving anyway, across the room and over behind the sofa with Loki. “One in five,” he said. “Wasn't that what I said?”

He didn't grab him or anything, he just stood there with his arms folded and that ever-present glass in his hand. I saw Loki's body tense at he went over there; I saw his eyes go wide, and his face go a little paler. Then when Tony didn't grab him, I saw a look of condescension come over his face. 

“I just have to know,” Tony said. “What's in this for you, Reindeer Games?”

Loki opened his mouth, then closed it again. He didn't say anything.

“See I could get into it if we were locking you up and throwing away the key,” Tony said. “That makes sense to me. This doesn't. What happens when we're done with you? Do you go to jail somewhere?”

There was no answer. The two of them stood there together. It was like the rest of us were watching their conversation, like it was a play. In a way, it highlighted the absurdity of what was happening: What had we all been watching the other times?

“I am released.” Loki seemed to be searching for the words. They came slowly and haltingly, not at all like his normal flow of talk. “I serve out my banishment until Odin decides it is over.” He looked down at his wrists, at the little silver bracelets that were the only thing he still had on. “These...” He raised an arm. “These seal my powers.”

“So in other words, as soon as we've all fucked you, you get to go?” Tony gave a short laugh. “Then I'm not fucking you. You can stay up here. Hell...” He waved a hand, gesturing all around the ruined penthouse. “I'll keep the whole goddamn thing just like _you_ made it. You can stay up here. Maybe sometimes I'll throw you a biscuit or something.”

It was crazy. But the thing was, I didn't know which part of it was the crazy part, whether it was Tony standing up against Asgardian justice, or the way the rest of us had just gone along with it. Or maybe it was the idea of him keeping Loki upstairs here forever like a housepet?

“Don't be ridiculous Stark, you can't do this.” I'm sure Director Fury was thinking the same thing we all were, that it had taken somebody crazy-drunk like Tony, to point out the craziness of what we were doing. He's our commanding officer though; it's his responsibility to make sure our missions succeed. ... _All_ our missions. For the first time since we'd gone up there, he moved away from the pillar he was leaning against. He crossed the room, and as he crossed it, he took off that leather jacket of his, like if Tony wasn't going to do it, he wanted to be ready himself.

“Does it bother you that you're letting down a friend?” he said. “I mean Stark, does it bother you?” Underneath the jacket, Fury wore a tight-fitting black shirt. He unzipped it. Then he threw that aside too. Now he stood, bare to the waist, his dark skin a contrast against Loki's and Tony's paleness. “Thor came to us. He asked us to do this. – Let's be serious here, it's not like it won't be done if we don't do it.”

“Oh, but we _are_ doing it.” Tony had his shirt off, but it's all he'd taken off. His skin was pale, faintly golden-colored. The main thing you noticed was the blue arc reactor, that seemed so out of place in the middle of his chest. He looked Fury in the face with a crazy, drunk-looking grin. “We're in the middle of it. We just stopped. Any minute now we might...” His voice broke off. I saw him throw a look at Loki, then his face went bleak.

“Yeah, I don't want him penned up here forever either,” he mumbled. “Fine, I'll do it.”

“Oh really?” Loki's head bent, then raised. He was looking Tony up and down. A cynical light came into his face. “About your _performance issues_?”

Tony gave him a taste of the crazy drunk-grin again. “You're going to make them go away.” He unzipped his jeans, stepped out of them. He emptied his glass. – He had to do that, it seemed; he couldn't stand to waste any of the Scotch. -- “Come here, Rudolph” he said. “Come make Poppa happy.”

“ _Poppa_?” I heard a spurt of nervous laughter from Natasha.

“Were you comfortable last night, Rudolph?” Tony slid down his BVDs and stepped out of them. At the angle we were looking at him from, I couldn't tell what he was offering Loki. Nothing still? Was he starting to get ready? He didn't seem like he cared at all one way or the other, which wasn't what I would have expected from someone with his playboy-reputation. “It's supposed to rain again tonight. Temps are supposed be in the mid-90's tomorrow, and humidity the same.”

“A weather report?” I heard Clint say on one side of me.

“He wants him to want it,” Natasha said. “So he won't have to feel guilty.”

She was right, I think. I thought then, that there was no way any of us were coming out of this without feeling guilty, even if it was Loki we were doing it to. But of course Tony's a civilian. There are things he doesn't understand.

“Come here, Reindeer Games,” he said.

Fury looked over at him. “I'll help you, Stark.” he said. 

“No that's okay,” Tony said. “He'll do it.”

He did, too. I don't know if it was Odin's magic, or Tony's crazy, drunk-logic, but Loki went over, and he knelt down. I saw his head press close between Tony's legs. Then I heard licking, slurping noises.

After a while, Tony started to look like he was getting into it. His back arched, his eyes closed, his hands went to both sides of Loki's head, holding him close. “Like that,” he muttered. “Take it all. – Goddammit, Reindeer Games, fuckin' _suck_ , why don't you!”

We saw them in silhouette, Tony's buttocks muscled from all the workouts he does, his stomach looking concave, with the way his back was arched. All you could see of Loki was that hair of his, that tangled mess of hair, hiding his face from view, and falling halfway down his pale back. His head bobbed, and he kept making those slurping noises, while Tony panted in a way that let you know he must have been getting what he wanted.

Then there was a gasp. “Swallow it, swallow it,” Tony said. Then, “yeah, Rudolph, just like that.” Then he gave Loki a push. It set him back on his heels, before Tony seemed to rethink and grabbed his arm and pulled him upright again. “You did good.” He patted him on one pale cheek. “I know some people in North Hollywood. I'll put in a good word.”

With one move, he was grabbing his jeans off the floor and stepping back into them. Next to him, Fury stared. “That doesn't count.” 

“Yeah it does,” Tony said. “It counted when Clint took him that way.” He had his t-shirt off the back of the sofa. He pulled it over his head, making his hair go everywhere, then shoved his arms through the sleeves. “Kiss him, why don't you, Director?” He jerked a thumb toward Loki, still on his knees behind the sofa. “I don't think the Odinforce has made my taste go away yet.”


	8. Fury's Turn

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Nobody really sees him as an Avenger, but Director Fury must see himself that way. At any rate, when he steps up and demands a turn with Loki, which one of them is going to tell him no?

“If that's supposed to be funny...” You know the thing with Tony doing it like he did, was that it woke us up to the weirdness of what was happening. It's like he was outside it all. – That doesn't make sense I know, because he _did_ it, just like we all did, but that's what it was like: Like he was outside of what the others of us were inside of. You looked at things from his perspective, and suddenly you realized how crazy this was. We'd gone from being Earth's defenders, to being Odin's punishers. Was that really what being a super-hero was all about? And the thing with it being Fury that went next, is that it didn't do much to make the rest of us less disoriented.

See nobody really likes Fury that much. He's in charge, we all take our orders from him, but there's no camaraderie. I think it's because he stays in his safe, secure bunker most of the time, while we go out and risk our necks.

...And you know, even as I say that, I can't help feeling kind of guilty. It's not Fury's fault he can't play on the same level as we all do. He doesn't have super-powers like me and Bruce do. He doesn't have a suit like Tony does ... _did_ , I mean, like Tony did. – You know I wonder what's going to happen with Tony now that the suit's gone. Maybe that means he's not an Avenger any more. – ...Fury doesn't have Clint's training, or Natasha's lifetime of experience getting herself in and out of trouble. Plus he's the liaison. It's his job to deal with the brass, to work things, so we can do our job. Maybe he'd like to be out there fighting, but he knows he can't.

The thing is though, that he doesn't. None of us have ever fought side-by-side with him the way we've done with each other. – The way we already had with each other, on the streets of Manhattan when we were defeating the Chitauri. – That's why it felt so wrong, having him join us and do this.

Fury was looking at Tony and there was anger on his face, and surprise as well. It was a “So, this is mutiny,” kind of a face, like the expression Captain Bligh wears when Mr. Christian stands up to him. “I don't know what you're thinking, Stark,” he said, “but we're all just doing a job here. We have to get it done.”

“Yeah.” Tony's voice was a snarl. “I think some of us are enjoying it more than others.”

Yeah, some of us were. All of us were. I don't know how you're supposed to engage in that level of physical stimulation and _not_ enjoy it. Peoples' bodies just aren't made that way. To tell the truth, your brains aren't made that way either. There's a whole lot more darkness inside us than most of us like to admit. But it felt like an insult for Tony to say it right out loud like that. 

...Actually, you know what, I'm wrong. It felt like an insult, yeah, but there was more to it than that. It felt ... _dangerous_ is what it is. It felt dangerous for him to come out and say what none of the rest of us wanted to even think.

Fury's good at what he does, though. He knew better than to let this line of conversation go any further. I saw a flicker in that one eye of his after what Tony said. Then his face went blank. “Funny, Stark.” He didn't say anything more to Tony. He just sort of ignored him, sort of pushed him to the side you might say, even though he didn't touch him. 

Loki was still on his knees. Behind the sofa like they were, all we saw was half his face, framed by that crazy-tangled hair of his. His eyes went from Fury to Tony, then back again, but his expression (as far as we could see) was a blank too.

“Remember the ant and the boot,” Fury said. “Which one are you now, Loki?” –

You know one thing that's never made any sense to me looking back on it? The whole time – I mean the _whole time_. – Loki never did seem to get wise to us. He never got it through his head that there was a time for not being a bastard. Right up to the end, he was still being just as rude and insulting as ever. Why would he do that? It doesn't make any sense. He had to have known we'd go easier on him if he made nice with us. You'd think he'd at least try, wouldn't you? What kid doesn't learn early on, that Momma's spanking won't hurt as hard if he says he's sorry to her first?

Maybe it's because he knew this had to be done, is what I think. He had to face this punishment. If it wasn't us that did it, it was going to be the Destroyer back on Asgard. Maybe he thought there were some of us who couldn't have handled it if he hadn't made us angry enough. ...Maybe he's right. Maybe none of us could have. -- 

At any rate, right up until the very end of what was happening, he was still just as rude to everyone as ever. He looked Fury up and down with a cool expression. “Taking power from the boot does not make the ant any more than an insect.”

I saw a muscle jump in Fury's jaw, but his face remained expressionless. “You don't take this seriously, do you?”

“Seriously?” Loki said. “Oh, I take it very seriously. You're going to violate me.” His eyes went to Fury's crotch. “If you can.”

See what I mean? He was playing with fire like that the whole time. It had to be because he wanted the punishment to be over with. 

If he wanted to make Fury angry enough that you could see it though, Loki succeeded and in spades. “I'll do it all right,” Fury grunted. “You're going to get exactly what's coming to you for once in your spoiled, privileged life.” He unzipped his pants and he stepped out of them. He's not tall enough to where we could see what was inside there, past the sofa that was in between us. He was ready to do what needed to be done though, I know that by what came next.

“Bend over,” he told Loki.

“Oh, Director...” – There was a while on the heli-carrier during the invasion, where you could tell Loki thought he was playing all of us for fools. He sat in chains, or he stood inside the containment-cell where Fury put him, and he had this smug look on his face, like he was the one in control. That sort of feeling was coming off him in waves, the whole time Fury dealt with him. He was in the catbird seat, as Red Barber would have put it. – “Are you sure you want to do it _here_?” I don't think there are words to describe the condescending tone he said it with. “Where everyone else will see your ...performance?”

Meanwhile of course, Tony obviously thought the whole thing was just as funny as hell. He was over next to the rest of us again, and he kept snickering at everything Loki was saying. 

“Got to hand it to Loki,” I said, just to show I understood what he was thinking. “The guy knows how to make an impression.”

Tony just snickered harder. “Yeah,” he said. “We'll see if Fury does too.”

Clint just stared straight ahead. If this was bothering him at all, he didn't let it show. Natasha glared at Tony though. “This isn't a joke,” she told him. “Can't you for once in your life, take something seriously?”

I don't know what Tony was going to say in return. That was when we heard a grunt, that was Fury shoving Loki up against the sofa. “Your ass,” he said, “is mine. – Bend over.”

“Make me.” Loki was still in the same challenging mood.

“Oh, you know I will.”

Loki's back was arched, and his head was up. We couldn't see what Fury was doing from where we were standing, but we could get a good idea from watching Loki. His face changed when he went in. First his eyes went wide, then you could see him bite down on his lip hard enough to draw blood. His mouth came open and he gasped once, twice, then in a third, long drawn-out gasp, that must have been when Fury was all the way in and things started going smoother. After that, there was just this set look on his face the whole rest of the time. His brows were drawn down, and his lips were pulled together. He looked like he was just trying to get through it.

Fury lasted longer than you'd think he would, an old guy like that (I say, even though by calendar years, I'm a few decades older than he is). He lasted until I thought Loki's set look might break, and he might start to show some emotion again. Then there was a long sigh that was him pulling out, and the next thing you knew, he was stepping out and away from the body, with his shirt and pants already back on. “I've never done anything like _that_ for SHIELD before,” he said.

Loki turned his head and looked at him. “It made no impression.”

“I can make an impression right now.” Fury didn't sound mad any more, just cheery, like when he'd had him in the cell on the heli-carrier.

It was Tony that sounded upset. “Can't we _not_?” he said. “We've all done it now. It's over. Can't we all let it be over?”

“Fine.” That just made Fury sound all the cheerier. “You're right, Stark. We've done the job. No point dragging this out any further.”

The problem was, none of us was exactly sure how to draw it to a close. Thor was gone. It didn't feel right somehow, asking Loki what was supposed to come next.

“Does this mean I'm stuck with him still up here in the penthouse?” I heard Tony say.

And, “I've got a cell at SHIELD Headquarters I'd like to put him in,” Fury said, still in his same cheery voice.

But it wasn't until Natasha went downstairs and got Thor that we were able to put an end to things.


	9. Aftermath

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> When it's all over, the one that gets to leave is the criminal. It's the others, who have to stay behind and deal with what happened.

I don't know what Thor was up to, all the time he was downstairs and we were up in the penthouse. He was drinking maybe. You couldn't have told from looking at him; Earth-alcohol never has very much effect on him. Maybe he was getting in touch with his father. 

Loki was starting to recover himself, from what Fury had done to him. He was back standing up again. He went over to where Hulk had thrown his pants when he'd stripped him. They were ripped halfway across. I saw Loki raise his hand over them, like he wanted to magic them back together. Then a thought crossed his mind, like he'd just remembered that Odin had taken away his magic, and he frowned. He went on and put the pants back on though, and when he looked at us, there was no doubt on his face, instead, there was a challenge. He put on the shirt Thor had ripped off him. Later on I saw Thor look over and wince when he saw how that was ripped off, and Loki kind of smiled.

We were all standing around in the penthouse, and there seemed like there was nothing to do but watch each other. Then Natasha came back up with Thor. 

The big guy looked like hell. His head was down, and his shoulders were drooping. He walked like he'd already run 20 miles – Hell, 100 miles! – and he still had twice as far more to go, before he could lie down. He looked over at his brother like. – Well he didn't look at him. He kind of threw snatches of looks his way. Then he'd look away again, and it hurt to see the expression that was on his face.

“Brother,” he said. “Are you ready?”

And real low from Loki, “I am _not_ your brother.” He looked up at Thor from the side. For a minute or so, you could see anger on his face. Then when he saw how Thor looked, it was replaced by a look of satisfaction. “I am a prisoner,” he said. “Odin's prisoner.”

Thor winced again.

“You should envy me.” Loki started in the way he does, with that poisonous tongue of his. “Unlike you, I am free. I may be powerless, but I can go where I want, do what I want, while you are at the beck and call of All...” – 

“Shut up!” Tony's the one that interrupted him, but we all wanted to. “Just shut the _fuck_ up. Really. After all that's happened, and this is how it still is? – After all we did?”

Loki turned on him right away, and his eyes got mean and glittery. I saw the trap then, right after Tony had walked right into it. “What did you do?” he said.

“We...” Tony's face went pale, and you could see his hands moving, working, like that would make them easier for him to say. “We r-r... We ra...”

“We _punished_ you,” Fury interrupted. “It's the law, your peoples' law. You know the old saying: If you can't do the time, don't do the crime.”

“The crime...” Tony wasn't talking _to_ anyone. He was just talking. He sounded sickened, like he was right on the edge of something, of throwing up, or of going crazy maybe. Then he looked at Fury. “Did you have to put it like that? Did you have to say 'crime', when he's not the only one who's done a crime? When we just ra... – I mean, when we just...”

“Say it,” I heard Natasha say very low. “When we just raped him. God, Tony, you're such a pussy.”

Neither Tony or Fury was listening to her though. They were facing off and neither of them was looking at anyone but each other. “It's so easy for you to be squeamish, isn't it?” Fury said. “Born with a silver spoon in your mouth, always had more money than God...” –

“And I have twice the brains that you'll ever have,” Tony said. “Don't forget that, _Director_.”

“The brains, fine. I'll give you the brains,” Fury gritted. “Haven't seen that much evidence of them...” He looked around at all of us. – Not at Loki, just at the rest of us, at the team. “You're Avengers,” he said. “It's time you started acting like it.”

Loki gave a nasty, insinuating kind of a laugh. “Where is the line that separates super-hero from villain?”

“Shut up.” Tony back-handed him without a thought. Then I heard his breath catch. He looked down at his hand, then his face went green.

“You think heroes never do anything that's not heroic?” Fury looked around at us. “Steve, you understand, don't you? Clint? Natasha?”

I understood. Nobody can be perfect all the time. We're just humans. What matters is if we're working for the right.

“This had to be done.” Fury looked around at us again. “What Loki did was mass genocide.”

“And what we did...” Tony didn't look at any of us. “I don't think I want to be a super-hero if this is what it means.”

“Oh no?” Fury said. “Fine then, you can go back to being a free-lancer in a metal suit. – Only wait...” He gave Tony a nasty look. Emotionless-Nick Fury wasn't anywhere to be seen then. ...Of course none of the rest of us were exactly calm either. “That didn't work out so well for you before, did it?” he said. “Maybe you should go back and run Stark Enterprises instead then. I'm sure your girlfriend would like you to be around for a change.”

There was a hiss of breath. It came from Natasha though, not Tony. She didn't look at any of us; we didn't look at her. All of us just stared at the ground.

I don't know what Loki was doing. Congratulating himself on how well his little trick had worked, probably. Finally, Fury spoke again. “That makes one Avenger out...”

It didn't, I wanted to say. Tony wouldn't desert the team. ...Actually now that I think about it, maybe that is what it meant. For both of them. Maybe him destroying all his suits like he did, makes more sense than I thought.

Fury looked around at all of us. “How about the rest of you?” he said. “Any of you want out too?”

I was the first one to speak up. “I don't.” At the time, I know I was kind of influenced by Fury's words. The way he phrased it, like the team was all-important, and Tony was the worst person in the world, for deserting it: It made you want to be on the other side. But if he asked again today, I'd say the same thing. Those people I saw running away from the Chitauri in Manhattan, they made an impact on me. Someone's got to stand between those people and danger, even if it's somebody who isn't perfect himself.

One by one, Clint and Natasha spoke up too. “I'm in,” Natasha said. And, “You know you've got me,” said Clint.

Fury looked at Thor. “How about you?”

“My brother is already someone else's lackey.” Loki said it really low, in the nastiest voice you ever heard. “He will have to ask All-Father for permission.”

“Silence.” I saw Thor's arms flex, but they stayed at his side. “I am Avenger for as long as you will have me,” he said. “I would not leave Midgard unprotected.”

He looked at his brother. “Are you ready?”

Loki nodded. He looked around at us. “I will _enjoy_ seeing you again,” he said. “I will make sure all of you pay.”

Pay? We all paid all right, at our own times, and in our own ways. We paid in terms of team spirit. Somehow after that, being an Avenger didn't feel quite the same as it had before. ...Then there was ...whatever happened with Tony. I'm not sure what that was. Clint and Natasha started sticking together more than ever. They were the insiders, the rest of us were outsiders, even though we'd all done the same things they had. And we all found ourselves looking at Bruce a little more nervously. It was hard not to think what it would have felt like if it had been us that Hulk had savaged the way he did. 

And of course there was no way any of us could come out of it with any illusions about what Fury was. ...Or what he'd have us do if he needed it done. We were okay with that. ...The ones of us that were left, we were okay with it because we had to be. We'd sized up our choices and we'd made a decision. There was no going back after that, though. Now we knew exactly what that decision was, and what it would cost us to stand by it.

“Bye, Reindeer Games.” Tony gave this jerky-looking wave. “Not that it hasn't been a little slice of Heaven, because it hasn't. Maybe we'll see you around.”

Loki looked at him, and he gave this horrible, big smile. “I will return Stark,” he said. “I have yet to claim that drink you offered.”

And that was it. After that, he left. We all looked around at each other. After a while, we went downstairs and got something to eat. Thor came back an hour or so later. We didn't ask him where he'd gone, or what he'd done with Loki. I just shoved the pizza box his way. Clint cracked open a beer and handed it to him. We all ate and drank together, and it was the craziest damn meal I've ever had with them, like we were family, and not-family, like we'd had fun, and condemned ourselves to Hell at the same time. But we were hungry, you know? A guy gets hungry. And then he has to eat.


End file.
